The invention concerns a method for manufacturing an NO/N2 gaseous mixture and subsequent packaging thereof in a receptacle, in particular in one or more gas bottles.
NO/N2 gaseous mixtures are commonly used for treating pulmonary vasoconstrictions in adults, children and in particular new-born babies suffering from primitive pulmonary hypertension or in patients undergoing heart surgery.
These NO/N2 mixtures are conventionally packaged in gas bottles made from steel and aluminium containing 100 to 1000 ppm by volume of NO and nitrogen (N2) for the remainder. These bottles typically have a water-equivalent capacity of 2 to 50 liters.
The packaging, that is to say the bottling of these mixtures, is done in gas bottling centres. To do this, one or more mixtures of NO and nitrogen are produced until the required NO concentration in the nitrogen is obtained.
However, it may happen that the NO/nitrogen mixtures thus produced are not in accordance with the specifications of the medical field since they contain an excessively high quantity of impurities, in particular of the NO2 type.
In other words, the reliability of the conventional methods for producing NO/N2 mixtures is often haphazard.
However, the NO2 impurities present in the final NO/nitrogen mixture produced pose a serious problem on a medical level since NO2 is highly toxic when it is inhaled by a patient, even in very small doses, namely around a few ppm by volume.
The problem is consequently to propose an improved method for producing NO/N2 gaseous mixtures ensuring good precision during the mixing of the gaseous compounds but also increased reliability and purity of the NO/N2 gaseous mixture produced and then packaged, that is to say able to produce NO/nitrogen mixtures free or almost free from NO2 impurities.